Solved Clone Win 7 and Win 8 drives failed

[fireberd]

I bought a higher capacity SSD and tried to clone my existing Win 7 SSD drive, both with the program supplied by Samsung (with the new SSD) and with Macrium Reflect Professional Edition (paid version). In both cases the clone completed but when booting with the new SSD, Windows displayed a "not genuine" notice and the desktop was missing. I also tried the clone on my Win 8 SSD (as it was going to be replaced by the original Win 7 SSD which is a higher capacity than the Win 8 SSD) and ran into similar problems.

I had current Macrium backups of the Win 7 and Win 8 SSD's that I made before attempting the clones. I restored from the backups to the new SSD's and all worked out OK.

Not sure why the cloning didn't work.

 

[gregrocker]

Are these UEFI installs to a GPT formatted disk? Did you confirm that the EFI System and hidden partition were transferred?

If a normal install to MBR disk, did you confirm the Partition Marked Active was transferred correctly and then run Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times with all other drives unplugged?

 

[fireberd]

Thess are not GPT. The BIOS is UEFI but I'm not using GPT. The Win 7 disc booted after the clone and both partitions were created (I watched the display as it was creating the clones) but it took a long time to boot and when it was finished there were no icons on the desktop and at the bottom right a "not genuine" message was displayed. The Win 8 disc is straight (no hidden partition).

The Win 8 would not boot and came up with a message about repair but it wouldn't boot to the start up repair.

As I had the full backups of each disc, and didn't want to try to get them working, I just did a restore from backup with Macrium and they are both working properly.

 

[gregrocker]

There are regular reports of cloning problems with Macrium lately. I suspect it has to do with UEFI settings, even in this case with Secure Boot disabled and CSM or Legacy BIOS enabled. Did Macrium ask you for these settings? Were you using the latest version?

 

[fireberd]

I used the latest Macrium version (downloaded yesterday before I made the backups and tried the clone).

The Samsung supplied "Data Migration" cloning program is a "Clonix Co Ltd" program.

 

[gregrocker]

Settings choices? Pictures can help.

 

[fireberd]

They are now "backed up" to the new drives. There are no screenshots for the cloning process.

I used the defaults in Macrium when doing the clone. I selected the drive I want to Clone (e.g. the Win 7 SSD - both partitions) and the destination was the new Samsung SSD (for Win 7). I did the same thing for Win 8 to the new SSD (the old Win 7 SSD).

Here is the statement from the Samsung program about the System Reserved Partition. The only option it allows is the Source drive to a Samsung SSD.

 

[gregrocker]

If there are no settings choices in Macrium to sync with the UEFI BIOS' settings enabling CSM and Legacy boot of any Macrium disk, then it may go to the BIOS changing settings for the target drive.

I've seen our Macrium expert Wolfgang suggesting to image instead. You might ask him to look in so we can get a resolution on Macrium cloning with UEFI BIOS which isn't working from all I've seen.

Make sure you have latest firmware and if you reinstall then I'd try UEFI to use all modern features. It may be cloning in Legacy that's the hitch.

 

[fireberd]

It would be a major task to reinstall with UEFI, now. The Windows 7 machine is my recording studio machine and it would mean reinstalling Sonar X3 Producer and all its included add-ons, Melodyne, Ozone 5, Antares autotune, etc. Reinstalling the drivers for the recording hardware.

Wolfgang winters about 25 miles south of me.

 

[whs]

As far as I have seen, cloning just does not work. And I have no clue why and never investigated it because I do not use cloning. Use imaging - that is a safe bet. But when you want to recover with the WinPE disc, set the BIOS to legacy.

 

[fireberd]

The first (and only) time I've ever tried to clone a drive.

Neither, of the two, clone programs worked.

Normally, I restore from an image.

 

[whs]

Right Jack, that is my experience too.

 

[whs]

Jack. I would like you to try the following. My suspicion is that the MBR is not pointing to the active partition.

Get the bootable CD of partition wizard iso and burn that to CD. Then boot the PC with that CD and inspect the cloned disk. See whether there is an active partition. If not, activate the one that has the bootmgr (Partition tab > Modify). You have to first highlight that partition.

Then highlight the disk in question, go to the Disk tab and 'Rebuild MBR". You have to APPLY (very top left) in order for it to execute. Then try again booting from that disk.

I don't know whether that will work, but it is worth a try.

 

[gregrocker]

If a normal install to MBR disk, did you confirm the Partition Marked Active was transferred correctly and then run Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times with all other drives unplugged?

Rebuild MBR can work but often still needs Startup Repairs.

 

[fireberd]

I no longer have a "cloned" disc. I rebuilt my SSD's from images.

 

[whs]

And I wanted to reproduce the problem and it did not work - see here: http://www.sevenforums.com/backup-restore/356208-cloning.html

 

[fireberd]

Murphy's Law says it will work when you don't want it to work.